The Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 is an HDR LCD laser projector with pixel-shifting technology. It's an Ultra Short Throw (UST) projector, so it's capable of projecting content at an extremely short distance from the screen or wall: it projects an 80" image at a distance of 0.9" and up to a 150" image at a distance of 9.9". It has three HDMI ports; one of which doubles as an ARC port, and each accepts a signal of up to 4k @ 60Hz. The third HDMI port, labeled 'Game,' can project 1080p @ 120Hz, which is great for gamers. It has an integrated 2.1 Yamaha sound system with two full-range 5W speakers and a 10W subwoofer. It has Bluetooth 5.0 and Wi-Fi 5 support and comes with the Android TV smart interface with full Chromecast integration.
Our Verdict
The Epson LS800 is good for watching movies. It's very bright, so it performs well in moderately-lit rooms, and it looks satisfactory in dark rooms due to its decent contrast, as its whites are very bright next to the image's blacks. The projector is bright enough to take advantage of its satisfactory color gamut, so its colors are decently vibrant, although most of them are oversaturated. The LS800's color accuracy is decent overall, even without calibration. Although the projector has limited calibration options, you can easily improve its accuracy by adjusting a few settings.
- Very bright.
- Has a full suite of smart features with Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0.
- Ultra Short Throw projector that you can place very close to the wall or screen.
- Doesn't have any calibration features for color accuracy purists.
No Dolby Vision or HDR10+ support.
The Epson LS800 is decent for living-room gaming on a very big screen. It's one of the brightest ultra-short-throw projectors available. Games look punchy once you dim the lights, even if native contrast isn't on the level of a dedicated home theater unit; this means that it isn't the best choice for image quality in a completely dark room. It accepts 4k at 60Hz and 1080p at 120Hz, and in its Game Mode preset, the projector pares back processing to keep input lag relatively low, especially at 120Hz. It's not low enough for serious competitors, but most people will be satisfied with the unit's latency. Unfortunately, it doesn't have Dolby Vision or 1440p support.
- Very bright.
Has a dedicated Game Mode for responsive gaming.
Supports most common gaming resolutions.
No Dolby Vision or HDR10+ support.
No true native 1440p support.
The Epson LS800 is a very bright ultra-short-throw projector, making it a great fit for a living room setup. It has enough light output to stay usable with some lamps or daylight in the room, and once you dim the lights, its image really pops. Brightness is very uniform across the screen, with only slightly darker corners, so you don't see obvious hot spots.
Very bright for a UST; handles some ambient light.
Fantastic brightness uniformity with only slightly darker corners.
The Epson LS800's contrast is decent but not class-leading. In a dark room, blacks never look completely inky, so letterbox bars and very dark scenes take on a gray cast compared to the best UST projectors. It fares much better in mixed and brighter scenes, where its strong brightness helps highlights stand out, and the raised black level is less noticeable.
Contrast looks punchy in mixed and bright scenes.
Blacks look gray in dark scenes.
Changelog
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Updated Jan 14, 2026:
We've modified the text in our Brightness and Native Contrast text boxes as a result of our latest test bench and added a Sequential Contrast test. We've also added Brightness and Contrast performance usages in the Verdict section.
- Updated Jan 14, 2026: We've converted the review to Test Bench 0.11, which renames our Contrast test to Native Contrast, and adds a Sequential Contrast test box. We also added new Brightness and Contrast performance usages in Our Verdict. See the 0.11 changelog.
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Updated Oct 03, 2025:
We made some minor adjustments before our official TBU 0.10 launch.
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Updated Oct 03, 2025:
We've added text to the Imaging, Optics, Noise, Supported Resolutions, HDR Format Support, 3D, Input Lag, and Audio Passthrough boxes as a result of our latest test bench. We've also added Gaming and Game Mode Responsiveness usages in the Verdict section.
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Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We bought and tested the Epson LS800. This projector doesn't have any variants, but it has a lower-tier model, the Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS300, which is very similar to the LS800 but without pixel-shifting technology, so it is limited to 1080p @ 60Hz input on its two HDMI ports.
| Model | Type | Native / Processing | Light Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS300 | UST (ultra-short-throw) | 1080p (no pixel-shift) | Laser (3LCD) |
| Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 | UST | 4k PRO-UHD pixel-shift | Laser (3LCD) |
| Epson EpiqVision Mini EF12 | Portable (standard throw) | 1080p | Laser (3LCD) |
| Epson EpiqVision Flex CO-W01 | Portable / room-to-room (standard throw) | WXGA (1280×800) | Lamp (3LCD) |
Our unit was manufactured in the Philippines.
Popular Projector Comparisons
The Epson LS800 is a very bright Ultra Short Throw (UST) projector with decent contrast and a full smart platform, including Android TV, Wi-Fi 5, and Bluetooth 5.0. Outside of its pixel-shifting 4k signal support and 1080p @ 120Hz gaming capability, it's quite similar in overall image quality to the much cheaper 1080p Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS300. If you want pixel-shifting and deep blacks for a dark room, the NexiGo Aurora Pro is a better choice, and if you don't need UST at all, the Epson Home Cinema 3800 is cheaper with better overall image quality. If you specifically need both pixel-shifting and UST convenience for a bright living room, however, the LS800 remains one of the stronger options on the market.
Check out our recommendations for the best 4k projectors, the best projectors for home theater, and the best short-throw projectors. If you'd prefer a cheaper unit, look up the best projectors under $1,000 instead.
The Hisense PX3-PRO is better than the Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800, but they excel in different environments. The Epson is noticeably brighter, so it's the better option to use in rooms that aren't light controlled, or even as a patio option. The Hisense has the far better contrast, however, with punchier colors; this makes it the much better option for darker rooms. The Hisense also comes with a wider feature set than the Epson, making it more versatile.
The Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS300 and Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 are very similar projectors, with the main difference being that the LS300 is limited to 1080p @ 60Hz on its two HDMI ports. In comparison, the LS800 is a 4k pixel shift projector capable of up to 4k @ 60Hz on its three HDMI ports and 1080p @ 120Hz on its third port. This means that the LS800 also projects a sharper image overall, but the LS300 is much more accurate out-of-the-box.
The Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 is better than the Hisense PX1-PRO. They're both Ultra Short Throw (UST) projectors, but you can place the Epson even closer to the screen or wall than you can with the Hisense. The Epson is much brighter than the Hisense, so it's more versatile when it comes to room lighting conditions. While both projectors are decent regarding out-of-the-box accuracy, the Hisense has more calibration options, so it looks much better than the Epson after calibration. The Hisense also has a wider color gamut, but it's not bright enough to really make colors pop.
The NexiGo Aurora Pro and Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 have different use cases. The Epson is far brighter than the NexiGo; this makes the Epson more versatile when it comes to lighting conditions, as it can handle even moderately-lit rooms. The NexiGo, in turn, has noticeably deeper contrast, making for a more pleasant viewing experience in dark rooms. Out of the box, the Epson is far more accurate than the NexiGo, although you can calibrate them to a similar level. However, if you care about smart features, the Epson has the edge, as it has a fully-featured smart OS, while the NexiGo has a barebones Android TV implementation with no apps.
We've independently bought and tested over 60 projectors, and we've published all the detailed results for each so you can decide which one to buy. These have all been tested under the same standardized methodology, allowing you to compare them side by side. We still have all these projects in our lab so we can continually go back and compare them to ensure our reviews are still accurate. All our test methodology is also public on our website, so you can validate the results yourself.
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Test Results
The Epson LS800's peak brightness is excellent. It's easily bright enough for a moderately lit living room, and it looks even more impactful once you dim the lights. Brightness uniformity is fantastic overall, although the image's corners are a little dimmer than the rest.
We used the 'Cinema' Picture Mode for our unit, but the table below shows that all picture modes are very bright. Therefore, you can select the one whose color and motion settings you prefer without worrying too much about light output.
| Picture Mode | WLO | CLO |
|---|---|---|
| Dynamic | 3422 lm | 3511 lm |
| Vivid | 2440 lm | 2477 lm |
| Natural | 2010 lm | 2003 lm |
The Epson LS800 has decent contrast. It doesn't deliver truly inky blacks, and in a dark room, its black level is clearly raised, so letterbox bars and very dark scenes look a bit gray. In mixed or brighter scenes, though, whites are very bright compared to the blacks, so the image still looks punchy and enjoyable. If you want a UST projector with deeper blacks for dark-room movie watching, consider the NexiGo Aurora Pro instead.
The projector has a decently wide color gamut. It does an excellent job with the Rec. 709 color space, which is used with SDR content, although most of its colors are oversaturated, and cyan is undersaturated. Unfortunately, it doesn't display the wider Rec. 2020 color space very well. If that's what you're primarily looking for, the AWOL Vision LTV-3000 Pro has an extremely wide color gamut in the Rec. 2020 color space.
The projector has decent pre-calibration accuracy. Its white balance is satisfactory, although reds are underrepresented in most shades of gray, while blues are overrepresented in the brighter shades. Its color accuracy is alright, but the projector struggles with representing accurate blues and greens, and its purples are too blue. The projector's color temperature leans very cold, giving everything a blueish tint, and its gamma is too dark in most scenes. If you care about Pre-Calibration Color Accuracy, consider the XGIMI AURA 2 instead.
The Epson LS800 has very limited calibration options. Still, after turning off all image processing features and lowering the saturation and color temperature settings, the projector's white balance and color temperature are much better than they were out of the box. As for color accuracy, it's also improved, but blues and greens are still inaccurate, although purples are now much better.
The Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 uses a 3LCD imaging system paired with Epson's 4K PRO-UHD pixel shifting. That means it isn't a native 4K projector; it uses fast 1080p panels and two-phase shifting to place more addressable pixels on screen, which boosts fine detail compared with a 1080p-only model.
The light source is a laser-phosphor module rated for a long service life with no lamp to replace. Its spectral power distribution looks like most blue-laser/phosphor engines: a narrow spike in blue and a broad green-to-yellow hump from the phosphor, with comparatively less deep-red energy, so most saturated reds aren't as intense as you'll see on tri-laser designs.
This is an ultra-short-throw projector with a fixed lens, so there's no optical zoom. Placement is measured in inches from the wall rather than feet. Manual focus and digital keystone are available, but there's no lens shift, so the cleanest geometry comes from careful physical placement. Epson advertises a 0.4 maximum throw ratio, but it's just a digital zoom. A 100-inch image puts the chassis just a handful of inches from the wall, and even a 120- to 150-inch setup keeps it well under two feet away. Here's a list of projection distances for numerous screen sizes:
- 80″ → ~11.2 in (0.93 ft)
- 90″ → ~12.6 in (1.05 ft)
- 100″ → ~13.9 in (1.16 ft)
- 120″ → ~16.7 in (1.39 ft)
- 130″ → ~18.1 in (1.51 ft)
- 150″ → ~20.9 in (1.74 ft)
The Epson LS800 is a massive projector, so it's not easy to move around. It also lacks an integrated battery, so it must be plugged into an outlet. The projector lacks auto keystone correction, so you'll need to adjust the image manually whenever you set it up. Additionally, it doesn't have autofocus. It has an integrated Yamaha 2.1 speaker system, so you won't need to worry about connecting it to a soundbar if you move it.
With the laser at full output, the fans are plainly audible from a seat near the projector. Dropping the brightness by 25 points pulls the noise down a notch, and in a room with some ambient sound, the fan recedes into the background. In a quiet room, though, you'll clearly hear it, especially if you're near the unit.
The projector has three HDMI 2.0 ports, and each accepts a signal of up to 4k @ 60Hz. The third HDMI port can also project 1080p @ 120Hz, which is great for gamers. It has three USB ports, but one is only for power delivery. The remaining two USB ports are full data ports but are limited to USB 2.0 speeds. Otherwise, the projector has one mini-USB service port, a 3.5mm audio out port, and an optical audio out port. The projector also supports Bluetooth 5.0 and Wi-Fi 5.
The Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 supports most common resolutions. Chroma 4:4:4 at 4k/60Hz requires using Game Mode on HDMI port 3, and so does 1080p @ 120Hz.
In Game Mode, the Epson EpiqVision Ultra LS800 feels quick enough, especially at 120Hz in 1080p. 60Hz is definitely slower, but it's still quick enough for single-player titles.
The Epson LS800 projector has HDMI ARC (no eARC) plus an optical output, and our unit was fussy about format changes. During testing, ARC would sometimes get "stuck" after switching codecs; we often had to play a basic PCM 2.0 clip or force a new HDMI handshake to recover from an unwanted PCM 2.0 downmix. Feeding 7.1 LPCM was especially problematic: the AVR reported PCM 2.0, and the audio was garbled instead of the expected channel identification voice.
The Epson LS800 has Android TV built-in, with full Chromecast integration, so you can share your phone or laptop screen directly with the projector. The projector has an integrated 2.1 speaker setup from Yamaha, with two full-range 5W speakers and a 10W subwoofer.